Many animals, such as cows, horses, mink, gerbils, rabbits, turkeys, chickens, etc. are kept in confined areas such as stalls or cages. Because accumulation of animal excreta inside of the stall or cage would be unsanitary and could cause health problems in both the animals and the people who work with the animals, it is important that the excreta be efficiently removed. Instead of washing out the inside of the stall or cage, an absorbent animal bedding can be used that absorbs and mixes with the animal excreta. Once the animal excreta is absorbed by or mixed with the absorbent bedding, the soiled bedding, along with the excreta, can be easily removed.
Many years ago, straw was used almost exclusively as a bedding material. However, straw is no longer widely used. The decline in the use of straw as an animal bedding can be attributed to the fact that straw is no longer thrashed, but combined. Combining separates the absorbent chaff from the straw portion. The absorbent chaff is then tilled into the soil. Therefore, the remaining straw does not have the absorbency of the straw product of years ago and consequently no longer makes an acceptable bedding. Additionally, straw is slow to decay and therefore massive amounts of straw and excreta commonly accumulate wherever the soiled bedding is disposed.
Today, a widely used bedding material is wood shavings, including sawdust. Wood shavings are easier to use, more economical, and much easier to clean from a stall than straw bedding. However, wood shavings are a by-product of a parent industry and are subject to the demands of that industry. Additionally, like straw, wood shavings are slow to decompose, taking approximately six years.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,519,340 to Dickey teaches an absorbant composition for animal excreta made from dried, chopped corn stalks. The composition contains dried, chopped corn stalks mixed with lime and an organic material having a density greater than the corn stalks such as wood shavings, hulls of cereal grains, chopped soybean stalks and chopped straw. The use of processed corn stalks as an animal bedding has many advantages over the use of straw or wood chips. Corn stalks are very pithy and therefore a bedding made of corn stalks is very absorbant. Additionally, corn stalks are a by-product of an annual crop and are therefore readily available.
Although corn stalks are absorbent and readily available, corn stalks are infrequently used as an animal bedding due to difficulties that arise when processing the raw corn stalks. Corn stalks typically contain excess moisture that must be removed prior to use as an animal bedding. However, corn stalks are highly flammable when dry and consequently are difficult to dry without causing a fire. A fire can not only slow production of the animal bedding, but a fire can destroy the entire processing plant. As a result, it has not been profitable to convert processed corn stalks into an animal bedding.
In addition to the problems associated with the production of animal bedding from corn stalks, the resulting bedding made from corn stalks can be dusty and infested with microbes. The dust present in the bedding, along with the microbes, can cause respiratory illness or other health related problems in the animals using the bedding.
Nonetheless, the widespread availability and absorbant nature of corn stalks makes the use of corn stalks as an animal bedding a desirable prospect. Therefore there is a need for a method to make an absorbant bedding out of corn stalks wherein the corn stalks are not ignited and the bedding is relatively free of dust and microbes.